Kader Abdolah (born 1952 in Iran) studied physics in Tehran and was active in the student resistance. He published two novels about life under the Khomeini regime before fleeing his homeland in 1985. At the invitation of the United Nations, he arrived in the Netherlands as a political refugee in 1988. He quickly mastered the language and has now written and published four books: The Eagles (1993), a collection of short stories which won an award for bestselling literary debut; The Girls and the Partisans (1995); The Journey of the Empty Bottles (1997); and Cuneiform (2000). In 1997, Abdolah received the Dutch Media Prize for his collected columns from De Volkskrant.

Cuneiform has been published in Germany, France, and Norway and will soon be published in Italy, Denmark, and Spain.